Farmers and volunteers spend three days each year planting the rice paddy art pieces, some of which can stretch over nearly four acres. The designs draw more than 100,000 tourists annually to Inakadate, a town of 9,000 where rice production is the dominant industry.

"I feel happy to see many people come to see our rice paddies because, here in Inakadate Village, rice and people's lives are very closely connected," the head of the rice art project, Akio Nakayama, told the Japan Times in 2007.